


The Things We Regret Most

by CaptainDeryn



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst, Dragon Age: Inquisition - Trespasser DLC, Dragon Age: Inquisition-Trespasser Spoilers, F/M, Injury, depictions of violence, threat of death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-16
Updated: 2020-11-16
Packaged: 2021-03-09 21:14:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,092
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27582568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CaptainDeryn/pseuds/CaptainDeryn
Summary: Cullen Rutherford learned not to hold regrets a long time ago, else it would destroy him. Failing to separate his lover, Tucdela from Inquisitor, when she needed it most is a regret that haunts him, years after the events of Trespasser.
Relationships: Female Inquisitor/Cullen Rutherford, Female Lavellan/Cullen Rutherford
Kudos: 16





	The Things We Regret Most

(Ferelden; unknown year post 9:44)

Long term regrets were not something that Cullen clung to. He learned long ago, back in Ferelden’s Circle and twice over in Kirkwall, that if he did not learn to forgive himself for some things then he would simply collapse beneath their weight. Regrets needed to be acknowledged, yes. Changes needed to be made in accordance. But then they were allowed to fall away so that new regrets may take their place. It was an ever persisting cycle. 

Failing to separate Tucdela from the Inquisitor when it mattered most...that had dug its claws into his shoulders and refused to be shaken, even now. 

It crept upon him in the quietest of moments. In bed at night, when Tucdela was pressed against his side and softly snoring into his shoulder, it plagued his waking thoughts. 

Even in peaceful times, sitting in front of the hearth, he would look at Tucdela bouncing their daughter in her lap with a bright smile, and a twinge of what she could have avoided had he just opened his eyes would twist deep in his gut. How much suffering she could have been spared if duty had been set aside for a moment.

He hadn’t been able to sleep beside her for weeks without waking in a cold sweat hearing her screams echoing in his ears, or without turning over to check that she was still peacefully slumbering and not covered in her own blood. Running his hands across her skin in simple pleasure had become unthinkable for far too long after the Exalted Council--each new scar his fingers would touch screamed at him that it could have been avoided. 

\-- 

(The Exalted Council; 9:44 Dragon)

The moment Tucdela’s saint-like patience and clear-headed kindness with her advisors faltered, alarm bells should have been sent ringing in Cullen’s head. 

The Inquisitor remained unnaturally quiet as he, Leliana, and Josephine bickered back and forth over the details of the Exalted Council, staring hard at the wall. Tucdela had never been one to contribute to strategic talks, she claimed it was out of her wheelhouse and she was much better at listening and learning rather than forcing in a baseless opinion. Yet this silence reigned differently, far less contemplative and far more volatile. 

Her eyes narrowed suddenly, her mouth twisting in a hard line. 

“Everyone, enough!” she snapped, voice tearing through their argument like barbed claws. Surprised enough by the vitriol in her voice, they all faltered and stared at her. She glared back, green eyes unnaturally bright as though she was running a fever. Her cheeks were flushed red too, Cullen noted with a spike of worry worming its way into his mind. Far redder than her usual flush. 

“What’s the point?” Tucdela continued. “All they ever are is angry! We save Orlais, they’re angry. We save Fereldan, and they’re angry. We save the whole  _ fucking  _ world and they’re! still! Angry!” she broke off with a cry, bucking over on herself.   
  


She stumbled, going to a knee and clutching at the edge of the table to keep herself on her feet. Her teeth ground together hard enough that he could see her jaw jumping. 

Cullen reached for her, but she batted his hand away with a sharp, “Don’t!”

He hovered, hands half poised to help without making a move to touch her. The last time he had seen her this agitated, if there had ever been such a point, was far from memory.

She took several ragged breaths, the mark pulsing a sickly green. The spike of worry drove painful through his chest again when he saw the green tendrils following the veins up her arm. 

As if feeling his gaze, Tucdela tucked her arm close to herself, steadied her breath and stood. 

All the acid had drained from her voice. Fear and a deep, deep pain weighed it down instead, 

“And now it’s all going to end. It’s all going to fall apart again. So what are we trying to do, exactly?” 

Shaking her head she added, “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I’m just--this is a lot.” she looked around at them, eyes lingering on Cullen. Although her words addressed them all, it felt as though extra emphasis went to him, “I’m alright. I think I’ll just go rest a bit before the meetings tonight, if that is okay?” 

“Of course, Inquisitor.” Josephine said carefully. “We will send for you if anything urgent calls. You need your strength.” 

And then she was gone, slipping through the door and closing it softly behind her with slumped shoulders and a heavy gait. 

An uneasy silence fell across the advisors. 

“I should go after her.” Cullen said, eyes fixed on the door. 

“No,” Leliana said firmly. “She’ll be alright. We need you here--we need a plan.” 

Like a fool, Cullen stayed, tearing his eyes away from the door. Claw number one dug its way into his shoulder. 

Hours slipped by until he was able to tear himself away from his work for a moment. Tucdela was curled on top of the plush Orlesian duvet when he crept into their shared quarters. A pillow was clutched close to her chest, a trick he knew she had started to smother the ever present figure of the Anchor. 

Her eyelids twitched as he tiptoed over, caught in a restless and fitful sleep. He was just here to make sure she was alright, he had told himself. Leliana and Josephine still required his help and he was lucky that his leash had been slackened enough to make it out here. And yet something still drew him to sink onto the edge of the bed and run his hand down her shoulder. 

Heat radiated from her even with the cool air coming in through the open window, her cheeks still heavily flushed.

Just as he began to pull away she caught at his hand, eyes cracking open to heavy slits. The Anchor had made them bright, Fade green. Two twin pools of the Breach itself sunken into tired circles. 

“Are you alright?” he whispered and she gave a small, sleepy nod. 

She ran her fingers over his knuckles, drawing her hand up to tug at his wrist, “Stay here?” 

Every part of him said that yes, he’d stay, except for his mouth, which froze on the words. The missive that had been shoved into his hands on his way over burned in his pocket and Leliana’s sharp demand that he only be gone a short while tugged at his mind. 

Wrapping his fingers around hers, he pulled her hand from his wrist and pressed a kiss to the digits. Then he leaned down and pressed a kiss to her burning forehead, wincing as he murmured, “I’ll be back soon.” 

“Okay…” she breathed out, burying her face back in the pillow. Before he closed the door on his way out, he looked over his shoulder once more and watched her shoulders shudder. It may just have been a breath, or perhaps a pain response from the Anchor. 

Looking back on it, nothing could convince him it hadn’t been a silent sob that he had chosen to miss. He should have laid down next to her, drawn her close, and held her then. 

But he didn’t. 

They say that with halla, they don’t show their suffering until it becomes near unbearable. Even with the Anchor pulsing worse and worse with the stress of all Thedas on her shoulders, she rarely showed how deeply her pain ran. 

Only one other time did Tucdela break down enough to show her cracks.

Laying together in bed, away from prying eyes and preying duties, another surge struck the Anchor. Tucdela curled in on herself with a cry and lay shuddering for several minutes. Green veins pulsed all the way up her arm. When Cullen finally massaged her rigid limbs out of the fetal position, tears were streaking down her cheeks. 

He pulled her close, pressed a kiss to the top of her head and continued to run his hand from her shoulder to her hip as another tremor shook her. 

The Maker damned mark...they’d considered it so useful without once considering the consequences. How often had they, no, even  _ he _ , sent her out to close Rifts or fight demons? How many times had his urging brought her one step closer to this moment? It was all what-ifs and past mistakes and yet still a soft, “I’m sorry,” still slipped from his lips. 

“ _ Vhenan _ ,” Tucdela rasped, her eyes still closed. “You’re thinking too much again.” 

“I won’t let you go.” Another slip of the tongue and Cullen silently cursed himself. What did he mean? He wasn’t going to let her free from his embrace, or he wasn’t going to let the mark kill her? 

She took it as the latter, a soft, mirthless laugh escaping her, “I don’t want to die.” she admitted and his heart stopped beating all together. “But it’s not up to you, or me. It’s out of our control.” 

A chill spread through him, peppering goosebumps across his skin. He pressed tighter to her. 

The quiet resignation made it sound as though she was prepared to die. Not ready, no, no one was ever truly ready to die, but accepting that that was to be her fate. 

“We can still find something.” he said adamantly. Only for her to hum in acknowledgement, but not agreement. 

“You can’t fight ancient magic.” she said simply, and ended the conversation there. 

He’d never know and never asked if she’d had a gut feeling of what was going to happen when she departed with Varric, Dorian, and Bull the next day, or if she’d simply made an unfortunately accurate comment. 

But he knew that he should have held her closer that night, kissed her harder that morning, and begged the Maker with more fevor to bring her back safely. 

It felt like years from when the party departed after the qunari and when the scout burst through the doors with their first sign of news. 

Perhaps not the first sign, Leliana had slipped in moments prior looking a little ill. Cullen had simply written it off as worry, just as the rest of them felt. 

“Commander!” the scout addressed him, and Cullen rocked to his feet. The missive from Baraneth Theirin addressing the Inquisitor fell to the side. It wouldn’t be picked up again or read for several days. “The Inquisitor’s party is returning.”

Leliana and Josephine both looked up from their work, sharing a concerned look. 

“And,” Josephine prompted, “Were they successful?” 

Silence, uncomfortable and stretching until Cullen snapped, “Well? Report!” 

The scout sank their teeth into their lip, forcing the words out, “I don’t know, Lady Ambassador, Commander.” 

All three advisors burst out with questions at once until the scout scrambled back, cowering against the door. 

“What do you mean you  _ don’t  _ know?” 

“What happened?” 

“Is the Inquisitor alright? Varric, Dorian? Bull?” 

A deadly pause fell after the last question fell from Josephine’s lips. Hearts dropped to the floor, breaths caught at the lack of immediate answer. 

“Well, where are they!?” The scout flinched away from Cullen’s voice and perhaps he would have apologized if he hadn’t been caught on the agonized expression the scout wore. The look of someone with bad news to bear that they had no desire to deliver. 

Cold dread flowed through him. 

“As far as I am aware, the Inquisitor’s party all arrived safely.” 

“And the Inquisitor?” his voice shook. He had heard hedged replies, given them himself to agonized families of fallen templars and soldiers alike. This scout couldn’t,  _ wouldn’t _ , look him in the eyes and tell him that Tucdela had fallen, so close to the end of the line. This was supposed to be when they wrapped things up, stepped away from it all, and finally found their future. 

They had promised that to each other, under the eyes of the Maker and the Dalish Pantheon both only days ago. 

“Tell me what happened to the Inquisitor!” Cullen demanded, voice breaking. The scout floundered, finally giving him a hopeless look. 

“Commander, I don’t know. The Iron Bull carried her back and that’s the most I saw.” 

Before his mind fully caught up to his feet, Cullen was pushing past the scout and into the halls. It is without shame that he can admit he ran to the courtyard, pushing past curious staff members until he broke into the crowd. 

Nobility were clustered in the courtyard, shrieking and babbling with their kerchiefs over mouths and eyes. Mages and healers were trying to shoulder their way through, shouts lost in the general din. 

“Everybody, leave!” Cullen roared, truly the Lion of Ferelden. “This is an Inquisition matter and Inquisition matter alone!” 

Whether it was his shout, or Inquisition forces moving in to control the crowd, or even just the understanding that that was not an order to be defied, the crowd began to part. 

He shouldered through, breaking through to the spectacle they all stared at. The party that had accompanied Tucdela gathered together off to the side, none the worse for wear it seemed on the outside. Varric stared somewhere in the distance, eyes determinedly unfocused and vacant from the chaos and panic around him. Dorian paced in the small square of room he had, first hovering over his mouth looking one wrong step away from being sick. 

Only Bull broke away from them, striding over to Cullen. His hand fell hard on Cullen’s shoulder, keeping him from walking further. While Cullen thought to protest, bile instead of words rose in his throat when he saw that Bull’s armor was slicked with blood. The hand that fell on Cullen’s shoulder was coated with it. 

“That’s not--” he gasped out. 

“I don’t think you want to be here, Commander.” Bull said gently, but firmly. “You want to wait elsewhere.” 

Already shaking his head, Cullen gaped and closed his mouth repeatedly before finding anything to say first. “Where--is that--is she?” 

“She went dead--” Bull cleared his throat, reassessing his words, “She went silent on our way back, I don’t know any more than that.” 

Cullen’s legs went to jelly and it felt as though Bull’s hand was the only thing keeping him from toppling forward. He stared at the mages and healers clustered not far away, just not realizing that they had to be surrounding  _ her _ . 

A shuddering breath shook his whole frame and Bull tightened his grip on Cullen’s shoulder, “Commander, I highly suggest you go elsewhere and wait for news.” 

_ Wait until they declare it _ . Was what Bull was really saying.  _ Wait until they clean the battle and death from her and make her presentable for grief _ . 

It was only meant with the well meaning of someone who had seen too much death firsthand, but Cullen wouldn’t budge. The ground may have gone out from under him, but his feet were someone still rooted to this very spot. 

The last thing he’d done was press a kiss to her forehead and tell her to be safe. That couldn’t be the last memory he had to hold on to her, was it? 

A clamor rose from the healers, a series of shouts and hand waving that broke Cullen partially from his trance. 

The wall of bodies broke momentarily, revealing Tucdela half hoisted between two healers onto a stretcher. She lay limp, her head lolling towards Cullen and Bull. Her eyes were open but unseeing, entirely overtaken by a green glow. Blood trailed from her nose and mouth and dripped in a near steady stream from the arm that bore the Anchor. 

Cullen’s stomach rolled, the threat of being sick rising over him again. This was it, she was gone...the Anchor had taken her away and-- 

And he stumbled after the healers, catching one on the shoulder. She whipped around, eyes frenzied. She was one of the Inquisition’s healers and her eyes softened slightly when she saw that it was Cullen. 

“Is she…” Cullen couldn’t even get the word out, but the healer understood him well enough. 

“She’s breathing, for now.” she said shortly. “But don’t let that get your hopes up, Commander.” 

“Can I see her, can I help?” he asked, pleaded really. 

The healer was already shaking her head, “It’s best you let us work.” she said. “But if you must you may wait outside.” 

Like a lost stray, Cullen trailed behind them until they reached her quarters. The heavy door was slammed in his face and he sank to the ground next to it, leaning against the wall. 

He had left Tucdela one two many times to abandon her now. If he was to be here when she passed instead of woke, then that would be his punishment for only seeing the Inquisitor.

Clasping his hands in front of him, Cullen bent his head and prayed to the Maker. 

His knuckles turned white as an agonized wail rose from the room next to him. It rose again and again, until Cullen wasn’t so sure the Maker could even hear him. After all, did the Maker hear prayers from the remnants of battlefields, when only the screams of the wounded and dying remained? 

\---

He was there for her as soon as the healers opened the door to him. He sank to the bed next to her, wrapped his arms as close to around her as he dared, and rested his head against her chest just to hear the beating of her heart. It thrummed its steady beat, moment after moment, waylaying the fear in his own heart that it would cease to beat. 

The bandages were rough against his cheek. It felt strange for his left hand to meet her side instead of her arm. Her arm was a small price to pay for her life; that was what the healers had said, what he secretly thought. 

Tucdela herself might not think the same. Dread clouded his thoughts for when she would wake up, an archer waking from death’s door to find that one of the tools most necessary to her craft ripped away from her. 

But at least she would wake up. 

And when she did, Cullen determined, awake once again in the long, fitful night to make sure that she was still breathing and to rhythmically check her bandages just to give himself something to do, taking her for granted was never going to be a mistake he made again. 

  
  
  



End file.
